Jeremy Blaber says he made no effort to hide recording device during meeting with Kingston Mayor Shayne Gallo

KINGSTON, N.Y. -- For more than two hours, Jeremy Blaber says, he hung around City Hall on April 16, pretty certain he was going to be fired by Mayor Shayne Gallo from his job as a parking enforcement officer.

Before that day, the 25-year-old Kingston man says, he already had received a "heads-up" call from Gallo's girlfriend, Carrie Jones Ross, that the ax probably would fall, maybe on April 15.

The meeting was set for a day later.

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Blaber said that, as he waited for the session to begin, he already had decided he would use an iPhone, purchased two months earlier, to record what ended up being a vulgarity-laced tirade from Gallo as he fired Blaber from his $17,900 job.

"I knew his temper," Blaber said of why he made the recording. "I know how he gets. I knew I didn't violate any polices, so I wanted to get it on tape."

But, Blaber said, the iPhone was not tucked away in his pocket or secreted in some other way as it recorded a six-minute conversation that he ultimately turned over to the Freeman. The phone, Blaber said, was plopped right on Gallo's desk, inches away from the mayor's nameplate.

Blaber said neither Gallo nor city Corporation Counsel Andrew Zweben, who also attended the meeting, questioned the placement of the phone or whether Blaber was recording the meeting.

Blaber, who worked on Gallo's 2011 mayoral campaign, said he wasn't surprised that Gallo said nothing about the device. "During the campaign, he didn't even know how to use a computer," Blaber saud. "He is not technologically savvy."

Blaber said he entered Gallo's office about 3:15 p.m. April 16 after arriving at City Hall around 1 p.m., the scheduled start time of the meeting.

Blaber said Gallo left for lunch about 1:30 p.m. and told him to "hang loose" until he returned.

When Gallo returned, Blaber said, the mayor went into a meeting with somebody else.

When that meeting was over, Blaber said, he entered Gallo's office and took a seat in a chair on Gallo's left-hand side. Zweben sat on the right. There was a small table between them.

Blaber said he pushed the record button on the phone as he entered the office and then put the phone on the mayor's desk without telling either man that it was recording them.

On the recording, Gallo is heard screaming at Blaber, threatening to assault him and threatening to have him arrested if Blaber challenges his dismissal.

Gallo also accuses Blaber of illegally taking drugs since completing a 30-day rehabilitation program earlier this year.

Blaber says he has been free of painkillers since completing the rehab program.

Gallo, on the recording, tells Blaber he has become a "liability" to him.

On May 2, Gallo issued an apology for his behavior during the meeting with Blaber. Gallo stated that he considered Blaber part of his family.

Blaber is heard on the recording telling the mayor that he had passed three drug tests since coming out of rehab.

On Thursday, Blaber supplied the Freeman with the results of those tests, each showing negative signs of drug use.

The last test was administered on April 12, four days before Blaber was fired. Blaber said on Thursday that Gallo personally drove him to a clinic to take that test.

He also said the two exchanged heated words during the drive.

Blaber said that, had Zweben or Gallo asked during the meeting whether he was recording them, he would have admitted it. However, Blaber said, he would have continued the recording anyway.

Blaber said he never thought about the recording while it was being made.

"I was just focused on walking out of there with my job back," Blaber said.

Blaber said that, once the meeting was over and Gallo told him he was fired, he spoke briefly with Zweben, grabbed the phone, turned it off and left the office. He says some words were exchanged with Gallo in the hallway, but he has not said what they were.

Gallo has said that Blaber told him to "go f--" himself.

Later in April, Blaber released the recording to the Freeman. The newspaper then posted the audio on its website.

Gallo has alleged the meeting lasted 25 to 30 minutes and that some of Blaber's comments to him had been removed from the recording.

Blaber, however, has said the recording he provided is "110 percent the entire meeting." (The Freeman removed only a short reference to another former city employee.)

"There is some stuff in there that doesn't make me look too good, but at least the truth is out," Blaber said.